This “camera” uses ultrasound imaging techniques to create real-time, volumetric images of occlusions in arteries, but it’s built more like a miniature drum cymbal than a SLR. A donut-shaped silicon chip with a 1.5 millimeter diameter and 460 micron hole in the center houses sensing and transmitting circuitry and serves as the base of the diminutive device. A thin film on top of it flutters 0.00005 of a millimeter, creating sound waves which are captured by an array of 100 sensors on the chip, processed, and transmitted to an external video monitor at a rate of 60 frames per second via 13 gossamer cables that are threaded through a catheter.

The images it produces are able to replace two people in the surgical theater.

Though it’s roughly the size of a grain of uncooked quinoa, the images it produces are able to replace two people in the surgical theater. Prior to the invention of this speck-sized sensor, technicians would pore over lower-fidelity cross-sectional images and guide the surgeon verbally while she held the patient’s life in her hands. Degertekin likens his little invention to a flashlight that illuminates the obstructions in a blood vessel, giving doctors a direct look at what they’re up against.

The tiny camera is a breakthrough a decade in the making. Creating imagery with sound waves is old news, but being able to do so in a circulating blood vessel without killing the patient is a tough balancing act. Surgeons demand high-fidelity images, but high-power tools often heat up, causing the delicate silicon elements to fail and the patient’s blood to boil. Clever power controls allow Degertekin’s system to satisfy both audiences.

This “camera” uses ultrasound imaging techniques to create real-time, volumetric images of occlusions in arteries, but it’s built more like a miniature drum cymbal than a SLR. Image: Rob Felt

Brotherly Innovation

Many brothers bicker, but when Degertekin and his sibling get together, breakthroughs happen. “My brother is a cardiologist, and I get lots of ideas from talking with him,” he says. “He gave us the idea of miniaturizing this even further so we can put this technology on a guide wire.”

This sensor packs a tremendous amount of technology into a tiny package, but as with many inventions, it’s the user interface that makes all the difference. When catheters are used in heart surgery, the surgeon makes an incision on the wrist or leg of the patient and snakes a small guide wire through the patient’s vasculature until the problem area is reached. A catheter is slid over the wire, giving surgeons the ability to assess or address the blockage they discover.

The brilliance of Degertekin’s solution is that it fits seamlessly into a pre-existing workflow. His disc rides on the same guide wire as the catheter and expands the capabilities of a familiar form factor in much the same way Apple expanded the functionality of the phone without radically reinventing its shape.

While impressive technically, the real goal is to make cardiac surgery more efficient and accessible to a wider variety of patients. Open heart surgery isn’t viable for many senior citizens due to the invasive surgical techniques that are commonly employed, but this tool could help reduce the trauma associated with the intervention.

This tool could augment the surgeon’s senses in an intuitive fashion.

Tiny Sensors Foster New Gadgets

A device at this minuscule scale creates a variety of options, and Degertekin believes that the sensor can be added to other surgical devices, like the tip of a scalpel blade, to give surgeons the ability to see the tissue they’re cutting into. For instance, prostate surgeons require a delicate touch, and fractions of a millimeter can be the difference between life and death. This tool could augment the surgeon’s senses in an intuitive fashion and allow more accurate decisions, and incisions, to be made in vivo.

A donut-shaped silicon chip houses sensing and transmitting circuitry. A thin film on top of it flutters 0.00005 of a millimeter, creating sound waves which are captured by an array of 100 sensors, processed, and transmitted to an external video monitor at 60 frames per second. Image: F. Levent Degertekin

Another idea is to embed the sensor in a patch that could be placed over a broken bone before a cast is applied and provide orthopedists a real-time notification when the cast was ready to be removed. This idea pleases Degertekin, even though it doesn’t take advantage of the camera’s high frame rate. “If you’re looking at a bone fracture healing, it’s slow. You only need one image per day,” he says.

The next step is commercializing this spritely sensor with aims of making it wireless and usable in MRI scans, a process that will require extensive animal and human studies and clearance from the FDA. This process could take years, but Degertekin is already thinking about version 2.0. “Putting something like this into a pacemaker — that would be fantastic.”